On Wednesday I went to a Christmas concert in aid of cancer research at St. Mary Redcliffe church (for the first time in years I’m not singing in such as concert myself this year). Carol concerts lie on a continuum between services and concerts. Unlike pure concerts, they may include prayers and congregational hymns, but unlike services you have to pay to attend! This one was definitely at the ‘service’ end of the continuum. (A less satisfactory one was a concert I performed in at Bath’s Theatre Royal a few years ago, where we (choir and orchestra) sang to an embarrassingly small audience in the theatre stalls.)
This time the Exultate Singers sang several items on their own as well as leading the hymns, all known to me, and some of which I sang with them last year. The length of the nave was well used in Britten’s Hymn to the Virgin. The choir is singing another concert in St James Priory church on December 22nd and also has a new CD out. Details are on the choir website.